iWatch Wannabes: Not Ready for Prime Time

Barron's technology reporter Tiernan Ray ran 9 smart watches through their paces. He shares his findings and his outlook for the category.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

I ... wearable technology is billed as the next big Zangana Apple I watched maybe just around the corner ... these devices don't really look ready for primetime and Jack Otter Editor Barron's dot com ... I'm here with Tiernan Ray who writes on ... technology bought for Barron's ... and you've been testing no fewer than nine ... of these devices are wearing them all for us now was the Goebel class is is a nice touch ... ALM so first of all tell us what these things to or try to ... serve so I took a look at about nine of these in a prominent smartwatches and fitness bands ... is cutting two categories one of the fitness trackers like Jawbone Up and the Fitbit ... on the Nikkei fuel and all of these things you speedometers he's accelerometer sensors to tell you things like your steps helming Carol calories you're burning ... there's a whole other category of smartwatches ... that one for example from Qualcomm which is the top watch ... and that does things like get updates from your smartphone it tells you can incoming text Cingular take your phone on your pocket is the idea ... of heaven forbid haven't gone out at nearby cannot so yesterday I had a fit that in my pocket the lvl one I found out tonight ... with fourteen thousand steps those kind of fun but I'm not getting too excited about this what what's your verdict ... so this is a problem and in fact in testing I found that my best day with the Nikkei fuel ... was the day in which I was playing pool for four hours ... assertive waited nine it's because you walk around the table off but right now these are very crude measures ... up of your fitness steps how much did you move ... they're not very priests ... now ... as we said around the corner comes this Ottawa says a lot of excitement about it ... but they have to sell an awful lot of these things to move in new Apple ... the one you haven't seen any actual features that anyone ... know that's right every was kind of waiting and everyone describes this is the moment before the I phone arrived in mid two thousandseven when the category was made on the problem is there a lot of technologies if you will can every single one of these ... go on nine different devices ... you've got Proms with screen ... readability Yuka Proms with battery life you've got problems with maintaining a wireless connection to your phone ... on a new classroom broader question of what should they do should they allow you to respond to a text message ... or isn't enough to simply see as you have with ... the Pebble smartwatch ... oh I've got a text and then still have to take your phone out of your pocket so ... the question is the features but question's a basic tech capabilities ... and there is ... a funny joke going around on four chalet for him it's true I've back in nineteen ninety eight I believe Paul Krugman was asked about among other things the future the internet ... they sell by two thousand and five will be isn't that exciting is the fax machine ... ah so I don't want to be him ... ten years from now ... I'll what is your prediction for the future is is just the early stage of a very interesting development ... if you look at the technology the devices will get smarter ... and they will get ... cheaper is well ... on the one hand you have multiple sensors companies like OmniVision that make camera sensors ... will put multiple camera sensors even into where a bull's ... the wearable will be able to tell you where you are seeing the seas which for Macy's your which means Macy's Can adverts to you depending on where you are on and other companies such as at Mellon estimate electronics and Qualcomm and Intel will bring down the cost of the chips ... so that perhaps the highest in smartwatches will be ... healed two hundred and fifty to four hundred is they are today ... they might even get down below one hundred dollars ... others even the possibility that our for sale sign if they really wanna sell these devices ... as a companion to the smartphone wheeled ... give them away or subsidize them if they can be made to be cheap enough to predict ... what our plan strikes me that while as a consumer these things might not be great yet for a very specialized purposes it it might be that the sell ... in the military uses Ervor pantry obvious athletes now are being are able monetary their body and that's quite important for them is not just fun it's actually crucial for their performance ... T think that in the nation's we might see some real big announced the I think especially industrial uses and wearing Google Glass from ahead as you can tell ... and I find it's not great for walking around town or just the ... interacting in a social club but ... and if you think about the uses in health care for example doctors using this for tele medicine ... they can be capturing the video in real time ... in the operating room and transmitting it wirelessly to doctors who are ... corresponding consulting ... around the world aam Gear uses for people with disabilities ... where this is a lightweight computer basically to which you can speak voice commands that there are as you say all kinds of specialized uses ... especially in kind of non consumer industrial use ... so is just one toy noble words the future we have received too dunno three dunno for duno and will see when it finally reaches the right one ... ex Russian thinking ...